Frustrated about the pension

June 16th, 2016 at 01:09 pm

I am just plain frustrated. I'm not good at waiting to begin with, but this is about to drive me crazy. My first official day of retirement was May 24, but the retirement system had to wait until the district sent the information to them. Now I'm waiting until I hear from them to pay the penalty I have to pay for early retirement. I feel like I'm playing the waiting game. I called last week and was told that if I don't get my first pension check in July, I will get it in August which sounds good, but it will have the last few days of May, June, and July on it. The taxes will take a chunk out if all of it is included. Ouch.

DH and I did the grocery shopping today. We used to do it on Friday, but I'm trying to change over to Thursday. Aldi didn't have a couple of things, but the manager was checking us out and he asked if he found everything and I told him about two things they didn't have. He asked us to wait until he checked out the next person and he would go look in the back. Sure enough he did and they did have one item we wanted. That was kind of him. Kroger sent us some coupons on things we normally buy so that helped. A couple of my friends are like me and they cook and eat home a lot. We talk about what we fix and get ideas from each other. I sometimes think we spend a lot on groceries, but then I think how much it would cost to eat out a lot like some of the people I know do.

Speaking of eating out, DH and I did eat at a relatively expensive place last night for our 26th anniversary. We each had a beef filet and it was a delicious supper. And we paid cash for it!

Congratulations on your anniversary, I'm happy you did something special to celebrate and enjoyed the meal. Once the first retirement pay sorts out, I hope you'll celebrate that milestone too. Do they use automatic deposit? If withholding tax is excessive, you can look forward to a larger than usual refund when filing next February.

What are your retirement plans going forward? Do you enjoy gardening with DH? Are there lots of community events in you enjoy? My DH is struggling to recover from a group of surgeries last month so we have been home bound and missing all the early events, Lilac Festival, antique car shows, pre olympic Horse Jumping qualifiers, amateur sport leagues etc. Even our condo sized patio garden is looking forlorn as our attention is diverted.

Snafu, sorry you have been home bound. Hope DH is recovering nicely. My retirement plans include some day trips with DH, as well as a vacation this winter. I have been catching up on different projects that I put off. We cleaned the siding by hand the other day before it got so hot. DH basically does the gardening. That is his hobby, My hobby is cooking and canning as we get enough. I have enjoyed reading; I just finished book 41 for 2016. We have also been going to garage sales and visiting with friends.

CB so far, no, the budget hasn't effected the pension. It would be nice if fhe clowns would sit down and agree because some of the schools down here are letting parents know if they will be able to open on time or not. Some are saying yes, they can open, but only for a couple of months.